


Raised in Requiem

by BlooBlu



Series: Crime doesn't usually mean love [10]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Bars and Pubs, Implied Sexual Content, Implied gore to a cat, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Lock Picking, Minor Character Death, Orphanage, Police
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:15:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22517611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlooBlu/pseuds/BlooBlu
Summary: A "how did we get here" for Deceit. How he was raised and whatnot. I got maybe halfway through this before erasing everything and rewriting it all, lol.
Series: Crime doesn't usually mean love [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1584493
Comments: 3
Kudos: 66





	Raised in Requiem

Despite how he tends to play it off to other people, Deceit actually contemplates his earlier years fairly often. Not because he likes to, but it's the only real reference he has when it some to how a child should be raised. At least, that's how it used to be; of course, he has experience now and could completely forget about everything before he was 18 if he wanted.

But somehow that feels… disrespectful. To the people who, in retrospect, really tried to do right by him. His mother - working 3 jobs until the day it killed her, his teachers who saw that he wasn't doing well and just delt with it in the wrong way.

Maybe… some things are better forgotten, in the end. But when has he ever done what's best for himself?

. . .

**Pontiac, Michigan. February 1998**

Today, he is six. And that's a really big number! He can't even count how many he is on one hand anymore! There's something really fun about looking up at his momma and holding _both_ hands out, one like a high five and the other with just the pointing finger up.

There's no cake, no streamers or balloons or any of the other things he's heard is supposed to be at birthdays, but that's okay. Because momma is going to be home all day today, she promised! And- and not like, at home sleeping on the couch or drinking grape juice with her friends, like _actually_ playing with him! He can't even remember the last time that happened, maybe this is the first one! Because it's always work work work, no fun. And that's sad.

Today though, today! Today she's here and maybe drinking some but not ignoring him when she does! He's drinking his own juice from a box, he's tried asking for juice in a glass like momma, poured from a big bottle, but that's grape juice only for adults. So he has his box, she has her glass, and they're making puzzles together! She'll ask him for a word that means something but is only a certain number of letters, and he'll ask her to pass an edge piece. This is the greatest day ever!

…  
**Pontiac Michigan. Three days later.**

This is the _worst_ day ever. Momma went right back to work the very next morning, and she hasn't been back at _all_! She's always there for at least a little bit to change her work clothes to her other work clothes and cook something for him, but no! Now, he's sitting in the living room waiting for her to get back, and he's down to the last apple from the counter! All their other food has to be cooked and he doesn't know how cause momma never showed him how to use the stove or oven… 

He might have to try soon, though. It can't be _that_ hard… 

**Knock, Knock, Knock**.

Huh? Who's knocking? No one who ever knocks is nice. Momma and her friends always just walk right in, anyone else is tryna sell something, momma says. Don't answer the door if someone's knocking because if they see you're here and I'm not they'll get mad.

 **Knock, Knock, Knock**.

"This is the Michigan State Police, is anyone in there?"

Why would police come here? Is he being arrested!? No, he hasn't done anything wrong, what do they want him for?? Is this just someone tryna' scare him to opening the door so they can sell him stuff?

**Knock, Knock, Knock.**

…the banging is getting scary now. He should just open the door. He should- 

And then the door is opening all by itself. How? They shouldn't have a key, only momma has a key!

(It would be explained to him later that they _did_ have a key, a copy of momma's key, because the real one is 'evidence.')

. . .

**Pontiac, Michigan. May 2001.**

Nathan is nine now. Somehow that doesn't feel as big as six did. But he's definitely older. Some people are surprised because he apparently doesn't act nine years old. Why his soul is so old is beyond him, but maybe that's just something only adults can see.

_scratch scratch scratch._

He's got itchy spots now. Mostly on the back of his hands and around his neck, and 90% of it is on his left side. One doctor says it's eczema, another one says it's early signs of- vitah- vitalay- something with a v. Some sort of disease that will make his now dark skin grow patches of white. Awesome. Other kids already called him names because he was one color, now he's gonna be two colors and he's probably gonna look like a cow, too. Brown with white spots. Or is it white with brown spots? 

_scratch scratch scratch._

School ends for the summer soon, though. So that's nice. He doesn't really know what he'll do. Playing outside would be fun if he was allowed more than into the backyard by himself.

 _scratch scratch scratch_.

Yeah, that's something isn't it. There's _rules_ now. Momma had never really given him rules, just told him what was safe and not safe. There weren't any punishments for walking outside for a few blocks to the park or sneaking out at night because there was a cat outside he wanted to pet for a bit. Now, with this… family… that had taken him in, he can't do things. Of course, his mother had worried before but she was also gone too often to enforce anything, so as long as he always came back it was fine.

His first day here, in this stupid, _yellow house,_ he'd climbed out of his window to climb into the same tree as a nest of birds. Being two stories up is fun, because now he can just reach out a little and grab hold of a pretty big branch. Then it was just some scooching over and he was holding a handful of sunflower seeds out to a small family of nuthatches. They're some of the nicest birds out there, actually, especially ones that live in cities around lots of people.

For some reason, Mrs. Folder thought this was dangerous and yelled at him to get back inside. Of course, this just made him really want to do the opposite of whatever she said, so he remained in his spot until all of the seeds were gone from his hand. She had been furious when he was back inside, but that just made Nathan smile wider.

The lock they out on his window after that was what first drove him to learn how to pick them - it actually had a small keyhole like a padlock. He started with paperclips, trying to imitate the movies, but after several days of no progress he decided to try books. The library wasn't very far and it was easy enough to convince Mr. Folder to drive him there on weekends. Not like he could take home a book about locksmithing, but he could tear out the useful pages when no one was looking and stuff them inside a magazine, which he _could_ take home.

He learned that you actually need to bend it at the end just a little bit, which was a chore but he could do, and soon enough he was back to hanging out in his tree. Maybe he could have just gone outside and climbed up, but this seemed easier. Eventually Mrs. Folder realized she couldn't really stop him from going outside the window, and she would threaten other punishments. Taking things away, no dinner, and he'd already had a rolled up magazine to the ear and knew he didn't like it. There were a lot of things adults could do to make kids miserable, apparently.

 _scratch scratch scratch_.

About half a year later, Nathan would see a news report that had Mr. and Mrs. Folder in a panic, and he would realize that there are always bigger problems in the world. 

. . .

**Pontiac, Michigan. July 2004.**

When he was small, older kids would always make it out to be such a big deal to be a teenager, but he can't feel a difference. Sure, he's taller and smarter than he was a year ago, but on the actual day he turned 13, he felt no difference. 

That is to say, he's bored and generally tired. He doesn't live with the Folders anymore, he's back in the orphanage waiting for the next unfortunate couple to try and foster him. He's impressed with how long the last family, the Watsons, lasted. Every stay before had been maybe a year long at most, but they had stuck it through for 3 full Christmases.

It was almost a game for him now, to see how miserable he could make each family before they'd call it quits. If adults were allowed to have so much power over him just because they were older, he was going to show every last one of them the real meaning of rebellion.

Oh, it's Nathan's turn to the laundry again? Hope you don't mind if he uses dish soap instead of laundry soap.  
Your 500$ bourbon you were saving for the day you retired? Nathan drank about half of it and gave the other half to your eight year old twins.  
Your angry, stray cat that pissed on his jacket? Yeah, go look for it - tell him about it if you don't throw up first.

…Maybe he'd gotten a little more extreme over the years. So what? It's been about a week since he returned to the Terchoonian, and there's still bruises on his upper arm from being grabbed so tightly. Then again, Nathan could admit that there were plenty of things he needed to be dragged away from. Just, couldn't you grab him by the back of his shirt or something first?

At least the itching stopped a while back. The once patches of dead skin now just left identically shaped pale patches in their wake. It _was_ vitiligo. It's honestly not that bad, he'd thought the teasing would be unbearable; instead everyone just avoided him, thinking that whatever he had would happen to them if they came too close. Like it was some kind of cold- or in this case, more like the plague. At least he gets a table all to himself at lunch, no one to try and steal his lunch or push him around or get crumbs all over him.

He's just so _bored._

. . .  
**Pontiac, Michigan. December 2007.**

Being sixteen is nice. He's finally tall enough to sort of look 21, and with a decent fake ID in a sleazy bar he can get drinks and hang out any time now. Old Elmer will sell him 1$ shots if he helps wash dishes or mop up, and has offered him a job plenty of times. Nathan figures he'll take the guy up soon, give up on this whole school thing and just start working. Hell, he already does sort of have a job.

If you can call beating people up for money a real job, anyway. It's more of a gig. Somehow after getting into a couple of fights as a sophomore, some rumors got out that he'd take out anyone for a price. And while that ended up being true, it wasn't like he was advertising. Tons of teenagers had grudges on other teens or adults. People they thought they couldn't best in a fight, or couldn't because "she's a chick, dude, I can't hit her!" …But it's totally okay for someone _else_ to hit her?

...He doesn't care about his image, though. He'll wear a mask when he's paid to get revenge on the dude who got varsity first, or that kid who put up embarrassing photos of you all over school, but that's only so he can't be convicted without some other evidence. Can't go behind bars, obviously. No one would care enough to pay bail, and he's not really into manual labor or jail cells.

So yeah, maybe when winter break starts next week he'll take the job here and just not go back to school. If he ditches long enough he'll be expelled, and then he just needs to get away from the orphanage. Only two years til they'd kick him out anyway.

. . .  
**Pontiac, Michigan. October 2011.**

He's gotta get out of here. He doesn't care if the next town he gets to is shittier than here, he just needs _out_. It's Saturday, and he can't stand one more day in this place.

When he was 18 it had seemed like a great idea to move into the loft above Elmer's bar. He technically owned the space too but used it more for storage, having a decent home just a few miles away. When Nathan had found this out, he asked if he could rent the space out; have the money deducted from his checks or something, it would just be a lot more convenient.

Elmer had agreed and honestly what Nathan was paying for it was basically nothing. Though he was mostly just happy to have a space to himself. A small shower, a bedroom with whatever decorations he wanted, and no one around to steal his shit when he isn't looking.

And now Elmer is dead. He was old, he had a heart attack and couldn't get help in time, it happens. But… Nathan had been the one to find him. When he hadn't shown up to open the bar when he usually did, Nathan called home and no one answered. So he waited a few hours, maybe Elm was on his way. When he never came, Nathan called a few more times before just hopping on his bike to go check out Elmer's house - leaving a note on the door that they would probably be closed all day.

And he'd knocked, many times, before sighing with all of his impatient young soul and picking the lock. 6 seconds and he'd opened the door to see Elmer collapsed on his livingroom floor. He'd tried CPR, although he didn't know it, tried hitting the cold, pale body to get a response, before finally calling 911. They'd know better, obviously.

Now he was alone, crying in his room, _which isn't even his now,_ and knowing he has to leave soon. The family was somewhat sympathetic, knowing he and Elmer had had an arrangement, but they still wanted to tear the place down and turn it into something better. A diner or florist, he can't remember. They'd paid him pretty good "compensation" at least, and offered to let him attend the funeral. He wouldn't, it was tomorrow but he would be gone before then. All of his things that were important and carryable were packed, and he's taking a bus to Hamtramck tomorrow. Another shit town, hopefully a slightly less shit life waiting there.

…he just has to hope, now. Nothing else left.

. . .

**Hamtramck, Michigan. December 2014.**

He's getting a drink. It's cold outside, and only slightly less so inside. His apartment doesn't really have heating, but it blocks out the wind. But he can't be bothered to try and warm up his bed with a heating pad or go stay in a warmer one with some guy, so he's just going to go drink until he feels warm.

It doesn't really matter that he has a legitimate ID now, he'll still probably find trouble one way or another.

He's exactly 7 drinks in when the place starts to get a little quieter. Of course it isn't _quiet,_ but it's so late that most of the crowd is either gone home or piss drunk. Last call was just announced, and he decided to hell with it and got a nice top off, make is a double please, _sir_.

And when he thinks that maybe he can get away with a ninth drink, even as the last sucker still sitting in the bar, he is rather unceremoniously tossed out.

How much your life can change, just from one sneeze, huh?


End file.
